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I’m not sure that the forces of bigotry will appeal this case further, as it would give the attorneys who challenged the legality of Prop 8 a chance to humiliate them again in front of the Supreme Court.

Mitch

February 7, 2012 at 10:43 am

Here’s a link to the decision:

Of course I’m happy with the court for ruling Prop 8 unconstitutional, but I’m REALLY happy at the way they’ve gone about protecting their decision from a renegade SCOTUS.

The decision has been made on the narrowest possible grounds, and it is watertight. Unfortunately, it’s not sulfuric acid tight.

Basically, the decision says the court is evaluating ONLY whether a state may take away a right from a minority group, without presenting any rational state interest in the right. In this case, the right in question is SOLELY the right to designate a relationship with the term marriage, since the California Supreme Court has already said the only way Prop 8 can be legitimate is if that is the ONLY thing it does.

SCOTUS can overturn this, of course, and further discredit itself.

Anonymous

February 7, 2012 at 11:47 am

now watch as Mitt uses this to rally the troops. Even more funny, Newt will frame the decision as an attack on the decency of marriage.

The rapidity with which the general public has changed its mind on this issue is staggering, and a credit to the basic decency of the public, once it is able to see past stereotypes.

The issue might help Romney in some swing states, but I’ll bet reminding voters of his Mormon faith (Prop 8 was a Mormon production) will hurt him among “religious” voters more than gaybashing will help him among that set.

Even my vast reserves of cynicism are insufficient to imagining Gingrich trying to touch this.

Mitch

February 7, 2012 at 11:56 am

It might tear the ten or twenty most bigoted black religious conservatives away from Obama, I suppose, until they look up the history of the Mormon church on black issues.

“Proposition 8 serves no purpose, and has no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians in California, and to officially reclassify their relationships and families as inferior to those of opposite-sex couples.”
—Judge Stephen Reinhardt

In fairness, not exactly. The court made their decision based on their interpretation of the law. Other judges and courts might have ruled differently.

Just because a court makes a ruling, doesn’t necessarily make it right. It just makes it law, unless that decision is overturned, anyway. I understand the 9th Circuit is the most reversed court in the country.

Just to be clear, I’m glad they ruled the way they did in this case and hope the Supreme Court follows suit.

Mitch

February 7, 2012 at 2:55 pm

Fred’s exactly right. Law is always interpreted, sometimes in ways we can understand and agree with, sometimes in ways we can understand and disagree with, and sometimes (Bush v Gore) in ways that make many of us question the integrity of the interpreters.

This was a 2-1 decision, something like 80 pages by the majority and 20 or 30 of dissent. To me, the majority’s 80 pages are crystal clear and the dissent is tortured. I’m sure others will feel the opposite.

The majority said that they could not find a fig-leaf rational reason for California’s voters to constitutionally take away the right to marry from gay people. The dissenter found otherwise, largely by deciding that technicalities of the case made even the most microscopic of fig leaves acceptable.

The dissenter expressed no opinion on whether gay marriage was good or bad, or even whether opposition to gay marriage was sensible; only on whether it was conceivable that there was some rational reason not based on a desire to discriminate against gay people.

He found that in the argument that conceivably some straight people would decline to marry because they don’t like gay people and gay people could marry, saying it doesn’t matter if the law works because people discriminate. Pretty thin pickings, but Scalia can pretend to get nourishment from gravel.

Anonymous

February 7, 2012 at 3:26 pm

how has the mother of all fucked up not been smacking your asses while you sleep? For decades, homosexuals petitioned to not get beat to the curb for existing. Now there are kids clubs for gays, and the elders are focusing their shared effort to…join the army? Get married? Keep the fluke status, moranz….that’s your get-out-of-jail-free card. Go protest something that the rest of us give shit about, too. Marriage and war, ritual foundations among the very institutions that encouraged the beating of homosexuals to the curb for existing. Who the hell convinced these people that a lifetime of paperwork and a four year stay in uncle sam’s army experiment were activities they should persue in the first place?

Abraham Lincold said “not only will I let slaves join my army, EVERYBODY has to join my army or we’re going beat the shit out of them, throw them in prison and take all their stuff!”

And history reveres the great and gentle Abraham Lincoln, who freed the slaves and forced everybody to gun down eachother until him and his buddies had absolute control over the land they had just stolen by killing all the people who already lived there.

SNaFU

February 7, 2012 at 5:52 pm

To help balance the California budget, Prop 8 supporters need to release a new anti-depressant drug for lesbians; it’s called “Tricoxagain”

Thorstein Veblen

February 7, 2012 at 6:33 pm

Interesting juxtaposition this, with the ruckus over Obamacare requiring religious organizations who provide health insurance to cover contraceptives in their policies. Just like half the states, and even Italy, already do.

Now, I don’t know that much about homosexual sex acts, but I’m guessing that contraceptives don’t play a big part.

So, its ironic that, by not using contraceptives during sex, homosexuals may apparently be following the popes teachings more closely than most american catholic women. Maybe this loyalty will be rewarded with a more tolerant stance toward gay marriage?

Anonymous

February 7, 2012 at 6:36 pm

what, you never heard of the virgin birth?

Percy

February 7, 2012 at 8:07 pm

Hate to say it, and Obama has been a major disappointment to me, but SCOTUS will probably rule on this and there is a good chance that Obama will have another appointment to the supremes if he is reelected. That’s something to keep in mind when deciding to sit this one out or voting your conscience. Wish the incumbent party would have a primary just like the loosers do.

Percy

February 7, 2012 at 8:17 pm

Just to be clear for the trolls on here, I don’t like Obama for the exact opposite reason you do. He is not progressive/liberal enough.

So goes majority rule = Democracy. So, vote your hearts out for the corrupt and bought. They’ve nearly finished their looting of this country anyway.

Plain Jane

February 8, 2012 at 10:40 am

The majority can’t take away the rights of the minority, Joe. But you knew that, right?

We need instant run-off voting to break the stranglehold of the 2 major parties (corporate and corporate lite) which is why we’re never going to get it by asking them for it. Corrupt corporate-owned government is not a legitimate democracy and election campaigns full of lies and funded by bribes aren’t legitimate elections.

High Finance

February 8, 2012 at 11:00 am

When 40% of adults in the country described themselves as conservative and only 20% as liberal
people like PJ, Joe Blow and Percy are bound to be disappointed.

Plain Jane

February 8, 2012 at 11:06 am

And yet over 50% of the voters in 2008 voted for President Obama and his platform which was to the left of where it is now. Don’t make the mistake of believing that all of Obama’s disapproval ratings are from those to the right of him because there’s a significant percentage to the left and they aren’t EVER going to vote for a right wing extremist which is all the GOP is offering.

Time isn’t on your side, HiFi. The corporate media and the Republican party have turned “liberal” into an insult, so it’s no wonder that people are reluctant to admit to being progressive, but younger voters are definitely trending towards the left, so the pejorative will someday be “conservative.”

Thankfully, current Republican candidates for President are doing more than their share to further the process.

And polls show 63% of Americans favor increased taxes on the wealthiest.

So sure, there’s a big plurality of “conservative” voters who support gay marriage, think income inequality is a big problem, and favor increased taxes on the wealthiest. If it hadn’t been for forty years of demonization of the word “liberal,” I bet I’d know what those “conservative” voters would call themselves.

HiFi, the simple minded need to label others because they can not see beyond their narrow views or get beyond their single issue mentality. Ever wonder why sex is the main thing (the only thing) that concerns people who identify themselves as conservative? Could it be that it’s all they understand?

That explains their obsession with gay marriage and abortion.

People who think independently do not identify as conservative or liberal.

Thorstein Veblen

February 8, 2012 at 9:54 pm

You forgot their obsession with contraception. Which I thought had been put to bed years ago.

What Now

February 9, 2012 at 11:09 pm

“Anonymous says:
February 7, 2012 at 4:09 pm
Abraham Lincold said “not only will I let slaves join my army, EVERYBODY has to join my army or we’re going beat the shit out of them, throw them in prison and take all their stuff!”

“And history reveres the great and gentle Abraham Lincoln, who freed the slaves and forced everybody to gun down eachother until him and his buddies had absolute control over the land they had just stolen by killing all the people who already lived there.”

The ugly head of inbred racist sedition is alive and well in the T-KKKlanners and other “take back our government” organizations.

Get over it, Buuba Cletus!
You and your sister/aunt/cousin/farm animal bride got your asses whumped and GOOD!
Things are mighty different when you have to pick your own damn cotton and chop your own wood.
It’s obvious YOUR gene pool needs a thorough draining.

Anonymous

February 10, 2012 at 10:02 am

What Now is living in the past. 100 years from now, kids in gradeschool are going to learn how George W. Bush led the nation to victory in a brave and daring assault on the civilians of another country so that Starbucks and Walmart could prosper. But it’s gonna read more like “George Bush freed the slaves.”

Anonymous

February 10, 2012 at 10:04 am

…i mean, how dare anybody question the history of our unquestionably benevolent President, Abraham Lincoln, who gave us the gift of the draft and ordered his military to use lethal force on any and all civilians when necessary to impose it.